D&D 5E D&D's Classic Settings Are Not 'One Shots'

In an interview with ComicBook.com, WotC's Jeremy Crawford talked about the visits to Ravenloft, Eberron, Spelljammer, Dragonlance, and (the upcoming) Planescape we've seen over the last couple of years, and their intentions for the future.

He indicated that they plan to revisit some of these settings again in the future, noting that the setting books are among their most popular books.

We love [the campaign setting books], because they help highlight just how wonderfully rich D&D is. They highlight that D&D can be gothic horror. D&D can be fantasy in space. D&D can be trippy adventures in the afterlife, in terms of Planescape. D&D can be classic high fantasy, in the form of the Forgotten Realms. It can be sort of a steampunk-like fantasy, like in Eberron. We feel it's vital to visit these settings, to tell stories in them. And we look forward to returning to them. So we do not view these as one-shots.

- Jeremy Crawford​

The whole 'multiverse' concept that D&D is currently exploring plays into this, giving them opportunities to resist worlds.

When asked about the release schedule of these books, Crawford noted that the company plans its release schedule so that players get chance to play the material, not just read it, and they don't want to swamp people with too much content to use.

Our approach to how we design for the game and how we plan out the books for it is a play-first approach. At certain times in D&D's history, it's really been a read-first approach. Because we've had points in our history where we were producing so many books each year, there was no way anyone could play all of it. In some years it would be hard to play even a small percentage of the number of things that come out. Because we have a play-first approach, we want to make sure we're coming out with things at a pace where if you really wanted to, and even that would require a lot of weekends and evenings dedicated to D&D play, you could play a lot of it.

- Jeremy Crawford​

You can read more in the interview at ComicBook.com.

 

[Stormonu]

Oh, how is that? I've been debating picking it up.

I'm mostly making it from scratch*. If there's interest, I'll post my notes and maps afterward.

* There is at least one document out on the DM's Guild covering it by Megan Caldwell, but it's very barebones and a lot of "it could be this, it could be that" - I used very little from it.

 

[Remathilis]

Anywho, I'm going to be running a Cyre1313 adventure next Monday, so wish me luck.

I picked this up from DMs Guild and it helped flesh things out.

Dungeon Masters Guild

www.dmsguild.com

EDIT: nevermind you found it.

 

[Remathilis]

I'm mostly making it from scratch*. If there's interest, I'll post my notes and maps afterward.

* There is at least one document out on the DM's Guild covering it by Megan Caldwell, but it's very barebones and a lot of "it could be this, it could be that" - I used very little from it.

I found it very good for giving me ideas. Mine adventure involved an Aundair spy who has become a shadow learning who the VIP Guest was and sabotaging the elemental to stop the train and escape. The PCs had to contain the elemental (now a necromental) and destroyed the spy. As payment, the train dropped them off in the one place it can stop: Dread Metrol.

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

If Hasbro hopes making more money with videogames than cinema productions then we shouldn't be surprised they bet licecing out different settings for each videogame studio. Then if one of the projects didn't work too well, the prestige of the other settings as brands shouldn't be damaged too much. Dark Sun could be interesting for studios who dreamed with the licence of Conan the barbarian, for example. Capcomo could do something with Mystara again. Bioware could try something about Greyhawk, or Gamma World.

 

[QuentinGeorge]

Exactly. This guy remembers being a teenager!

The RPGs and books we bought at 15+ (and even a little before that) were the ones that seemed to be aimed at adults, and stuff that seemed to be aimed at kids, even about kids our age, just profoundly didn't get us, man (one of the biggest misses being Cybergeneration by Mike Pondsmith - we'd absolutely loved every part of Cyberpunk 2020, and then Cybergeneration basically is Mike Pondsmith proving that he does not remember being a child, let alone a teenager, AT ALL, as someone adults weirdly seem not to.

I strongly disagree. It's PG, not PG13 - that's the real problem here. Spelljammer in 2022 is exactly like it was in 1990 or whenever - super-cool if you're 12-14, unspeakably lame and awful if you're say, 16-18.


Witchlight yes. That's more like it and it shows they can get it. Though it slightly lacks bite/edge from what bits I've read.

Radiant Citadel is purely aimed at proving WotC are diverse (they aren't) and can celebrate diverse cultures (they can, but they usually don't) and so on. The problem is it's BORING AS HELL, because it's trying to be purely positive. It is most possibly the most profoundly boring setting/set of adventures that I've ever seen. If you look at work actually being produced by younger authors, it's approximately a thousand times more edgy and real and critical in its approach than Radiant Citadel. I think, even as ultra-left, way before-my-time kid (on every social issue), I would have balked at Radiant Citadel, just for it being boring. It's representation, which is cool, but it's not more than that - it's just representation, not a real change. And there won't be real change whilst the same WotC lifers are in charge of every department.

Disney has put out a couple of movies along similar lines, and stone cold guarantee people won't be going "How great was Raya and the Last Dragon?" in 10 years, they'll be going "That movie bored me senseless as a kid and had nothing to say and no style". This isn't true of all of Disney's recent output - I expect Encanto to survive the test of time - but it genuinely has more real edge, more to say about real people and relationships, than, say, Last Dragon.

@Ruin Explorer I am probably diamatrically opposed to you politically but I have to agree with you on Radiant Citadel (which I own), what's most amusing to me is that for a book of "diverse" settings, most of them seem to have some sort of colonial power lurking in the background and two of them even have the SAME colonial power!



Still, I did enjoy letting my players be cops for the fantasy version of the Ayatollah in not-Iran. (Shadow of the Sun).

 

[Gravenhurst48]

Spelljammer is currently the best selling adventure at Amazon.

I am surprised. I would return my copy to Amazon because I am so disappointed on almost everything written inside, but, I am a collector, and though the book case is the boring black binding 5e design, the three Spelljammer books and DM Screen have fabulous art. The truly amazing book covers should have been the book case cover. The artist used on the Spelljammer set I would compare to Easley covers on AD&D books.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I am surprised. I would return my copy to Amazon because I am so disappointed on almost everything written inside, but, I am a collector, and though the book case is the boring black binding 5e design, the three Spelljammer books and DM Screen have fabulous art. The truly amazing book covers should have been the book case cover. The artist used on the Spelljammer set I would compare to Easley covers on AD&D books.

I don't care about format or art, unless it costs me more money unnecessarily. I care about content.

 

[darjr]

I am surprised. I would return my copy to Amazon because I am so disappointed on almost everything written inside, but, I am a collector, and though the book case is the boring black binding 5e design, the three Spelljammer books and DM Screen have fabulous art. The truly amazing book covers should have been the book case cover. The artist used on the Spelljammer set I would compare to Easley covers on AD&D books.

Note I don’t believe it is anymore

 

[Parmandur]

Note I don’t believe it is anymore

Phandelver was like the second best selling D&D book the other day, in the 200s for all books.

 

[overgeeked]

Note I don’t believe it is anymore

I was recently given the Spelljammer slipcase as a gift. It was bought from Amazon. It happens to be the original version with the minstrel show art and racist hadozee description. WotC wildly overestimated the demand for this thing in the form presented. A lot of people clearly stepped away due to the various problems with the product.